The invention concerns an unbalance-compensating device for a weapon, especially a large-caliber weapon with a long barrel, with a component accommodating the barrel, mounted on trunnions in a stationary accommodation, and pivoting in elevation, whereby the pivoting component's center of gravity is outside the trunnions' axis of rotation, wherein a torque that counteracts the moment of unbalance is generated in that the weapon's pivoting component is attached by a flexible tractioning component to a device on the stationary accommodation that produces a positioning force, and wherein the tractioning component travels along a contour of prescribed shape attached to the weapon's pivoting component and determines the effective component of lifting force.
An unbalance-compensating device of this type is described in German AS 1 097 319 for example. The flexible tractioning component is a roller chain and the contour that determines the effective component of lifting force has teeth. The device that generates the positioning force is a tension spring connected at one end to the tractioning component and at the other to the stationary accommodation.
A similar unbalance-compensating device is described in German Patent 3 633 375. The device that generates the positioning force is either a spring or a system of springs. Means for displacing the springs' point of engagement to the stationary accommodation operate in conjunction with circuitry that takes the angle of the stationary accommodation into consideration when compensating for the unbalance.
It has been demonstrated that the springs in unbalance-compensating devices that employ springs or spring systems are heavy and stretch far enough, especially at high elevations, to take up a lot of space.
Unbalance-compensating devices that compensate for moments of unbalance with pneumatic cylinders are also known. The cylinders articulate in the case of a tank for example far forward of the trunnions' axis of rotation and are accordingly unprotected by the turret.
Converting the moment of unbalance into pressure that operates in a hydro-pneumatic reservoir is also known.
German OS 3 732 745 describes an unbalance-compensating device with a pneumatic cylinder communicating with a mechanism that compensates for temperature-dictated changes in the pressure of the gas. This mechanism communicates with a regulator connected to a source of compressed gas. A mechanism of this type can compensate for temperature-dictated changes in the torque that counteracts the moment of unbalance.
The articulation kinematics of such devices is embodied in a crank mechanism on the pivoting component of the weapon and leaves extensive residual unbalances that must be applied by the elevating gear or by a manually operated mechanism.